


Listening with Rapt Attention

by TheArchaeologist



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Accidental Children Acquisition, Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, Drama, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia is Bad at Communicating, Hurt Jaskier | Dandelion, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sexual Content, Injury, Jaskier | Dandelion Has a Past, Jaskier | Dandelion Needs a Hug, Light Angst, Roach is So Done (The Witcher), Swearing, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-09
Updated: 2020-04-09
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:07:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23565817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheArchaeologist/pseuds/TheArchaeologist
Summary: For Jaskier, waking up a little bruised is nothing new.Waking up on the floor is rude on the part of the person he was sharing a bed with, but there are worst things that happen in the world.Waking up in a ruined tavern, his ears ringing, and bodies scattered everywhere?That’s a new one.
Comments: 31
Kudos: 337





	Listening with Rapt Attention

He wakes to a ringing in his ear.

Now, granted, that is not usually what Jaskier wakes to, but considering his last memories are a somewhat hazy mess of blotchy images, yelling, and a fist grabbing at his clothes, he isn’t too concerned. Wives and mistresses and mothers tend to be loud and clingy, depending on the state of their marriage, and it certainly would not be the first time Jaskier woke a little battered and bitten from a night between the sheets.

Those who stay until the morning tend to be embarrassed and apologetic about it, all soft hands and whispered words, trying to soothe away the non-existent worries Jaskier has about the marks. Others prefer to leave only rumpled bedsheets and musky smells, vanishing before he can peel his eyes open from the bliss of sleep, and that is perfectly fine as well. Jaskier is a flexible man (as he sometimes likes to prove), he can roll with just about anything, especially these days.

Still, the ringing in his ear hasn’t died down yet, and Jaskier has the distinct impression that he is sprawled rather gracelessly across the floor.

A rude gesture, if ever there was one. If whoever he bedded was going to scurry off without so much as a thanks, the very least they could do was not toss him off the mattress on their way out.

Shifting, Jaskier clears his throat, fingers sloppily coming up to tug down his collar from where it clings around his throat.

With a frown, slow and mildly dazed, his hand start trailing downwards, finding neat buttons still caught in their holes and clasped buckles. Exploration further south proves not even his trousers have left him, sat snug as ever around his hips, the belt secure.

Was he so sloshed that he passed out before things even got exciting?

That would be embarrassing. Not since he was a teenager has he failed to hold his drink so badly.

Shoving his hands beneath him and finding the typical stickiness that comes with tavern floors, Jaskier forces his eyes open, blinking blearily around. The moment his gaze focuses, and it does take a good second, his breath catches, and he chokes on spit.

The inn is a mess, and it isn’t just part of its rustic charm. 

Scattered like the shattered sherds of a dropped vase, scorched timber, broken pieces of furniture, and several other bodies of dubious states of living twist and bend around the room. The ground, stained with urine-coloured ale and blood, smoulders, and every window whistles with the wind, the glass blown out and the frames warped. Embedded in the floor and walls, chunks of metal hiss with heat.

The ringing continues, and, extremely more awake than he was ten seconds ago, Jaskier carefully brushes his fingertips over his lobe. It comes back red.

He gulps. His mouth tastes like copper and ash.

Outside, the night lingers.

Stumbling to his feet, Jaskier calls out a shaky, “Geralt?”

Theoretically, anyway, because he doesn’t hear even the faintest croak of his voice.

Smacking his lips, his hand goes for his throat, feeling it bob with tasteless saliva. Bracing himself against the wall he had been oh-so-delicately shoved against, Jaskier tries to call out for Geralt again, and beneath his palm his voice vibrates with sound, but his ears pick up nothing but the white, whining ring.

“Great, fantastic…” He mutters, going to click his fingers beside his ear. Nothing changes. “A deafened bard.”

With any luck it will get better in a few minutes, at worst after a day or so. If not, then he will just have to convince Geralt to detour and visit a healer and pray they have some kind of concoction or potion that can help.

If not, if it really has all gone to absolute shit, he could ask Yennefer.

Then again, flinging himself off a cliff may be the better solution.

Jaskier yelps (probably) when the inn door bursts open and two men come stumbling through, their hands clawing and scratching and digging into one another’s flesh, and not in a good way. One has blood staining a nice white undershirt, and the other, a man dressed in a family crest and metal armour, is desperately trying to pierce his dagger into the poor sod’s eye.

White shirt’s foot catches and they trip over backwards, falling together, and the jerked jolt tells Jaskier exactly who just won this fight.

Clambering off the still warm body, the armoured man climbs to his feet, heaving for air and freezing when his gaze lands on Jaskier inching towards the door.

Mentally, Jaskier snaps his fingers in remembrance.

That was it, the townsfolk had been trying to convince Geralt to take a job ridding them of their local aristocrat, some posh-blood whose iron rule was a bit too iron and a bit too ruling for their tastes. Geralt had refused, stating that he only deals with monsters, not politics, which then lead to a however-many-on-one bar brawl.

Technically, however-many-on-two, because it took no time at all for the good people to turn on Jaskier as well.

This guy sports the typical colours of the ruling class, undoubtedly some minion or brawn sent out to do his master’s bidding. The landowner must have caught wind of their subject’s plotting.

The man says something, his voice muted by the shrill sound of the ringing and his face the picture of fed up. Jaskier can relate, because at the moment he too is fed up and would very much like to know what the shit is going on.

“Good Sir,” Jaskier hopefully says, praying his lips are forming the syllables he intends. He ducks into a bow. “I know what you’re thinking, what is a handsome bard such as myself doing in-”

The _Good Sir_ , apparently, has no patience for fluttery explanations and flowery words and simply lunges at him, and with a squawk Jaskier leaps out the way, tumbling like a newly birthed foal out the door.

If the inside of the inn was a mess, outside is a warzone.

At least three buildings stand on fire, sparks twirling against the black sky and embers drifting down like snowflakes. Great bellows of pluming smoke pollute the air, making it thick, suffocating, as if a dragon had breathed across the town. Numerous other structures are well on their way to joining them, not yet blazing but quickly blooming an orange glow.

Bodies litter the dirt path he and Geralt had wandered down not an hour earlier, the pooling blood reflecting flames as it cools on the earth. Townsfolk, wild and terrified, race like disturbed ants between the buildings, fleeing other armoured attackers and men on horseback.

A flash catches Jaskier’s eye, and he glances up to see something shoot through the air only to burst into scattered firework pieces, glass and flame raining down. The assistance of a mage, most probably, it is definitely a weapon he has never seen before.

It also explains the state of the inn.

Movement in the corner of his vision makes Jaskier turn, then bounce back on his toes.

“Woah!” Dodging the slice from the dagger, he skips away, his hands offered placatingly outwards in a likely useless attempt at calming the man. “Listen, I’m nothing to do with this! I’m just a bard! I sing songs for payment and booze and love, no more than that!”

The man is unimpressed, his lips moving in what looks like some kind of mocking sneer. Squinting, Jaskier tries to focus on the formation of his mouth, picking out the words _“rode in”_ and _“Witcher.”_

It really would be nice to have said Witcher here, with his lovely hearing and even lovelier sword.

“Geralt? I don’t know where he is.”

That is the wrong answer, because the man springs forward again.

With little choice, Jaskier does one of the many things he is fairly competent in.

He runs the fuck away.

It is a handy skill, especially when rolling with Geralt. Also, with alcoholic husbands, overprotective fathers, and fiancés not up to spreading some love. 

A quick peek over his shoulder tells him that he is worth the chase. The man is, while slowed by the weight of what he wears, hot on his heels.

“‘Scuse me, coming through!” Jaskier feels his throat cry as he whips around a corner, spooking a group of tethered horses as they dance unhappily on their hooves.

They must be petrified, poor things, surrounded by flame and screams. If Jaskier had his hearing, he would be willing bet they are making their displeasure very much known, but he doesn’t have his hearing, so he can’t bet, and he tries not to think about their fragile souls as he unhelpfully goes bolting by.

Thinking of horses, he hasn’t seen Roach yet, nor her rider.

A sharp pain strikes down his shoulder blade, and Jaskier spins on his heel just in time to snatch the wrist of the man before he can plunge the dagger deep into his back. Heat spreads across his clothes, dribbling down his skin in thick droplets, and grabbing the other hand as it springs forward for his throat, they sloppily dance, spurred by adrenaline and fire.

The man’s eyes are dark and hungry, a look Jaskier tends to steer clear from and let the big, scary Witcher deal with, and with their faces so close he can make out ever bristle sprouting from his grubby and blood-splattered chin.

To be honest, he would probably not be too bad after a good bath, one of those dangerous types Jaskier sometimes finds himself staggering upstairs with who prefer rough actions and violent snogs over gentle, heated words.

Beneath him, Jaskier’s feet start to slip, a bard’s smooth costume shoes on slick ground, and the man looms over him, only Jaskier’s weakening grip keeping them apart. Once again, the guy starts talking, probably threats or promises or something disgusting Jaskier should be grateful that he can’t hear, but the ringing remains true in his ear, grinding like teeth on dry chalk as it ebbs into his brain.

“Look, I don’t know what you’re trying to tell me…” Jaskier hisses through a tight jaw, cutting off whatever nonsense the man’s saying, “But I really can’t stay and chat.”

The man scoffs at him, pushing more of his weight onto Jaskier to try and force him to his knees.

He fails to see the incoming kick to the balls.

Jaskier gets a front row seat to the man’s eyes bulging out with pain and making use of the distraction he releases the hand without the dagger and swings his fist around, connecting harshly with the side of the guy’s head. There is no satisfying crack, but the man goes down like a discarded puppet, a small drool of red dribbling out the corner of his mouth.

Swiping the dagger from limp fingers, Jaskier pockets it away.

He damn near gets it out again when a hand forcefully spins him around, but he instantly settles at the sight of Geralt’s blazing eyes.

“Oh, _there_ you are. Where up Melitele’s arse did you crawl off to?”

“Jaskier.” Geralt starts, but then the rest is lost, the Witcher speaking too fast for him to follow and stubbornly only making the smallest of word formations with his lips.

Once he stops talking, Jaskiers asks, “What?”

Growling, going by the way the hand connecting them vibrates, Geralt tugs him forward and starts off at a soldier’s pace, his sword glinting in the bright, destructive light. He starts speaking again, but from the angle he drags Jaskier it is near impossible to see properly.

“Geralt! Geralt, stop!” Fighting the hand, Jaskier trips and blunders as his protests go ignored. Up ahead of them, just on the outskirts of town and hidden in the shadows, he spots Roach, several small someones huddled on her back. “Geralt, I can’t-”

A force slams into the side of them, making Jaskier yelp and Geralt barely stagger. It is a woman, he quickly realises, with soot on her face and blood on her chest. She is weeping, openly and messily, and like a person possessed she slams her fists into Geralt’s chest, yelling things obscured by Jaskier’s uncooperating sense of hearing.

She is the innkeeper, Jaskier suddenly recognises, one of the people spearheading Geralt’s hiring against the noble.

“Oi, hey,” Jaskier steps in, pushing the innkeeper back from Geralt. She smacks his hands away from her. “I don’t know what you’re saying, but-”

The woman screams at him while at the same time Geralt rumbles again with speech, but considering he can’t look at both of them at once, he focuses on the woman, picking up _“we said he was bad”_ , an insult aimed at him, and what might have been a name.

Energy apparently spent, the innkeeper weeps harder, collapsing to her knees.

Geralt drags him away, his face a stone gargoyle, leading them urgently towards Roach. Again, he starts talking, and it is honestly an insult that the _one_ time Geralt decides to be chatty, Jaskier has his hearing blown out.

As they approach Roach, the several someones morphing into the scared looks of four young children all tucked together, he tries to say as much.

“Geralt, listen to me, I can’t-” He shrieks when Geralt unceremoniously scoops an arm under his knees and dumps him behind the children, tossing the reigns at him.

The Witcher says something, and with a dawning horror Jaskier realises the words are instructions he can’t understand, but before he can so much as suck in breath, Geralt hits Roach’s flank and they take off, Jaskier and the kids all momentarily tipping backwards from the sudden gallop.

“Woah, woah, holy shit, okay!” Grappling for the reigns, Jaskier squeezes Roach’s middle with his thighs, trying to keep the kids balanced as they charge out of town and into the woods. “Melitele give me strength!”

Together, they ride into the woods, and it is bizarre to be flying so fast on Roach without being able to hear her steps, her whinnying, or her breath. He only has the feel of her stomach against his legs to guide him on her emotional state, but going by her panicked race, she is pretty spooked.

Hopefully, she is not hearing something Jaskier can’t.

Still, he checks over his shoulder, just in case.

At this height he has to be wary of low-hanging branches. Normally, on the very, very, _very_ rare occasions Geralt lets him hop up behind him, they go along dirt paths and roads, areas cleared to avoid scraping the tops of carriages and frustrating the nobles as they travel from one holiday villa to the next. Geralt stands, and sits, taller than Jaskier, and he has no issues sitting at his full height as they ride, unhindered thanks to the insistence gold-guilted rides avoid unnecessary scratches.

Unfortunately for Jaskier, Geralt didn’t find them a nice, clear path, instead aiming them at the woods and hoping for the best. 

The trees, untouched by human hands and allowed to grow wild, are tangled and gnarly, reaching around curiously to take up as much space as possible in the dense forest. Thin twigs scrape against his skin as they ride, and Jaskier ends up ducking as low as he is able with the children in front of him, trying to avoid getting smacked in the face and thrown off the mare’s back.

Said children grasp tightly to one another, small things with dull clothes and grubby faces, and one seems to have no idea on horse etiquette, turning around and trying to get on their knees.

“Stay seated.” Jaskier tells them, maybe a little too loud going by the flinch of the boy against his chest. “Don’t move or you’ll fall off.”

The boy against him appears to be the oldest, maybe somewhere between the ten and twelve mark, depending on how stunted his growth is, and tugging at Roach’s reigns to slow her into a trot, Jaskier taps him on the shoulder. A frowning face peers up at him.

“Hey, so, do you know where we’re meant to go? Or what to do?” Jaskier asks. “The man who sent us off, he-”

The boy says something, but his lips barely move.

Shaking his head, Jaskier points to his ears. “I can’t hear. I don’t know what Geralt was trying to tell me.”

Glaring now, the boy snaps something at him before turning away and crossing his arms in a huff. The three other children, another boy and two girls, all stare with wide, watery eyes.

Well, then.

Bringing Roach to a stop, Jaskier shuffles to look over his shoulder, getting greeted by nothing but darkness and the moon’s bright white light bouncing off the undergrowth. A faint haze on the horizon signals the town and the fire, but Jaskier reckons they must be a safe distance away now and being off the beaten track should hide them from any prying eyes.

Sliding off Roach, Jaskier smiles up at the three other children, pettily ignoring the oldest boy who pouts and scowls.

“Hi guys, my name’s Jaskier. That was all a bit scary, huh?” Three sets of eyes well up, and one of the girls nods silently. He pats her knee. “No need to worry about all that now. We’ll just camp out in this ol’ wood for a bit, then Geralt will come and find us. He’s pretty good at finding people, has the nose for it.” Tapping the side of his nose for emphasis, Jaskier grins and then holds out his hands. “Can I get you all down?”

Mucky hands instantly reach for him, and one by one he sets them down on the floor, suddenly noting their lack of shoes. The two girls huddle together, clasping hands and likely sisters, going by their shared freckles and bright red hair, and the other boy, the youngest, with a pudgy face and button nose, grabs onto his trouser leg.

The oldest boy sneers at him when Jaskier offers to help him down, swinging his leg over and sliding off Roach’s side. Roach whinnies at him, going by the way she shudders, and as her head angles their way, Jaskier wags a finger at her.

“Behave, they’re only children.”

The oldest boy hits him in the stomach for that, his mouth moving wildly. The other children shrink behind Jaskier as he coughs at the sudden assault, though in comparison to Geralt hitting him in the balls when they first met, it is no more than a bumblebee bumping into his side.

“ _Ow_ -”

Stamping his foot, the boy just rants, pointing and shouting and fingers curling into fists.

Holding out his hands, Jaskier backs up. “Okay, I’m sorry for calling you a child! Calm down!”

The boy does not calm down. He kicks Jaskier’s shins.

“Hey! _Hey!”_ His yell makes the younger ones jump and the boy startle, and Jaskier huffs, getting down to his knees partly to be at the kid’s eyelevel, partly to protect his private area from any flying feet. He waits until he has the boy’s full attention. “Look, I’ve lost my hearing, it got blown out when the inn was attacked. Whatever you’re saying to me, I can’t hear it. _But_ ,” He adds swiftly when the boy goes to interrupt, “I’m betting you’re blaming Geralt and me for the attack on the town, yes?”

The confirmation comes in the form of the boy crossing his arms, working his jaw like an old farmer with no teeth left. The youngest boy, taking advantage of Jaskier’s low height, starts trying to clamber onto his lap, and quietly Jaskier holds him to one side, rubbing a hand up and down his back to keep him happy for a moment.

“I get you’re angry, but Geralt and I only arrived an hour ago, even if he had taken your town’s job, he wouldn’t have been able to do anything to stop what’s happening now. This was planned, it was just coincidence that we turned up just before it started.”

The youngest boy slips his hands and successfully crawls onto his knee, clinging him and swinging his legs. He rubs a snotty nose into Jaskier’s clothes. The two girls then suddenly appear, still holding each other but also reaching out to secure hands on his sleeve.

When the oldest boy leaps at him and buries his face into the crook of Jaskier’s neck, he jumps.

“ _Oh_.”

A wetness slips against his skin, and the oldest boy’s shoulders hiccup. Then the youngest boy’s chin wobbles. Then both girls start trembling.

“Um…Okay, alright, um, everybody in, apparently we’re having a crying party.”

****

*****

As he sits on his arse on the slightly damp earth, a moody and untethered horse wandering around and four snivelling children cradled on his lap, Jaskier ponders if this would go down well in song form. Probably not, if he was being frank, though maybe it would do as one of those sad, sorrowful tunes drinkers sometimes request when they want to stare silently into the fire and brood all their wrongs.

Melitele, his shoulder hurts, and his head.

He can’t tell if the dagger injury is still bleeding or not, just that the forming scab has caught onto the fabric of his shirt and stuck to it, entwining the fibres with his drying blood. If he was to try and peel his layers off now, he would likely just reopen the wound, though he is not certain how deep it is.

It would be hurting more if there was anything super wrong with it, surely. If the man had succeeded in doing some really serious damage, Jaskier would have been withering on the floor in agony, and Geralt would not have dumped him on a horse and sent them away.

Jaskier will just have to hope so, because stitching and bandaging the cut is not going to happen for hours yet, and all their stuff got dumped in the room when they arrived at the inn, left in favour of food and drink.

Excluding his lute. She had been in the tavern with him so he could play and make some coin.

_Shit._

With waking being so disorientating, and the ensuing chase spooking him no end, the thought of his instrument completely escaped Jaskier’s mind. It hadn’t been immediately around him, nor anywhere nearby when he glanced about, so maybe someone had picked her up, or she was thrown among the tables when the room exploded.

The inn was still standing, when he left, and Geralt had looked ready to do all his Witcher-y business, so it is with all fingers and toes crossed that Jaskier hopes the building won’t be a pile of smoking timbres by the time he gets back, one elven lute included.

The oldest boy is the first to shuffle away from him, wiping at his face and sniffing, and although it is pretty damn dark, Jaskier thinks the kid almost looks _embarrassed_.

“So,” He starts, absently patting the backs of the other children, who make no move to save his legs from the oncoming pins and needles, “I’m Jaskier. What’s your name?”

The boy blinks at him, then shifts about, fiddling with his fingers. With what looks like a bit of bravery, he mouths something slowly.

“E...Er…Ern…” Jaskier tries to copy, frowning each time the boy shakes his head. “Say it again. Ernie? Earnly? Earnby? You know what? I’m just going to call you E, alright?”

With a roll of his eyes and a shrug, E nods, then points towards Roach.

“Oh, yes, have you ever handled a horse before?”

E nods again.

“Great, could you find a place to tether her? If she wanders off Geralt would kill me.” When he feels one of the children shiver at that, he quickly backtracks, “Not really! It’s fine! He’d just be grumpy with me for a while.”

With what might be a giggle, E goes and fetches Roach, who is remarkably well-behaved as she gets led over to a tree and tied to it, her tail swishing and ears moving. She has calmed somewhat after their run, and Jaskier has to admit, he is soothed a bit by the fact that she isn’t looking around for danger. 

Maybe it is because as a horse her hearing is better, or maybe she has been with Geralt for too long, but those two are pretty in sync when it comes to picking up on approaching threats. It would be almost comical, if some gristly monster didn’t try and eat their guts out a minute later.

If something decided to come stalking their way now, they would be pretty defenceless. The ringing has died a bit, leaving just an ache that he longs to take something for, but his hearing is still smothered by silence, successfully muting one of the handiest senses to have in a deep, dark forest. Unless whatever decides to stalk them reeks worse than the entrails Geralt frequently returns to their camp drenched in, Jaskier will have to rely on sight alone.

He sighs, shoulders slumping. There is no way he is going to get any sleep tonight.

“Okay, everybody up.” Patting the children’s backs, he rolls forward to slide them onto the ground, getting to his feet. The dark, thankfully, covers whatever mess they have created on the front of one his nicest outfits.

Groaning a silent curse, even though the kids have already heard him swear plenty, Jaskier glances around their little clearing, stretching out the numbness in his legs as he does.

The night isn’t the coldest he has ever experienced, but as the same time it is not exactly warm, either. None of the children are dressed for camping, in fact they are dressed in what’s probably supposed to be their nightclothes, and by morning they will all undoubtedly be shivering.

In an ideal world, Jaskier would start a fire. He knows how, he actually surprised Geralt by demonstrating that was, in fact, a skill he had before they started wandering together, though without his usual tools he would have to light it the old-fashioned way.

However, this isn’t an ideal world, and it takes no longer than a second for him to stub out that idea. Fire means warmth, yes, but also light, and if they are trying to keep a low profile, the last thing they need is a bright beacon signalling their location.

If the choice is being cold or perhaps certain death, then there really isn’t much of a choice.

“Right, so, um, E,” Turning to find the boy, Jaskier waves him over, putting a hand on his shoulder. “I’m going to need a pretty big favour from you. With my hearing gone I can’t tell if there’s anything heading our way, so I’m going to need you to help me. If you hear anything, or if you think something’s coming, you gotta let me know, alright?”

E says something, but then realises Jaskier won’t understand and just nods, rounding his shoulders a little as if to look taller and broader. Jaskier chuckles.

“Roach is here with us, so keep an eye on her. If she starts to get worried, then tell me, got it?”

“Got it.” E says, his mouth clear enough for Jaskier to make out.

“Great, thank you. Right, everyone!” Clapping his hands, Jaskier addresses the entire group, “Who’s up for the warmest cuddle ever?”

Finding himself a large stick he is pretty certain he would be able to bash around the head of anything nasty, or at the very least poke annoyingly until it went away, Jaskier plonks himself down against a tree trunk and readily accepts three small humans onto his lap. 

The youngest boy and one of the girls curl up one under each arm, the other girl pressing between them against his chest, kneeing him in the stomach as she gets herself comfortable. E, apparently deeming himself too grown up for proper cuddling, awkwardly leans against Jaskier’s arm, his legs drawn up.

Slipping off his doublet, and wincing when his shoulder twinges painfully, Jaskier drapes it over E, who promptly huffs and flings it over the other children instead.

“You’ll get cold.” Jaskier warns, but at the boy’s adamant glare shrugs and settles in for the night, leaning his head back but keeping his eyes wide open.

Roach, across from them, watches with relaxed ears, still saddled and reigned. 

Oh, Jaskier’s definitely going to pay for forgetting to free her from those later, a shame considering he has just started gaining a little bit of respect from the temperamental mare courtesy of a few cubes of sugar he sometimes carries around, but like shit is he getting up now all the children are settled. As good as E was with her, he doubts Roach will let him remove the saddle without an attempted nip or two. Unlike her rider, she has no added patience with children and their sticky fingers.

It is just for tonight, and she is a hardy girl, she’ll be fine. Anyway, if they have to make a quick getaway the saddle will give something for the children to cling onto rather than just her bare back.

Overhead, the moon shines high, framed by a symphony of stars. It is a rather beautiful sight, even if none of his little entourage would appreciate it at the moment. Geralt might, if he was here. Sometimes, when the mood around the campfire is particularly comfortable and the food was good, he manages to pry more than a few odd words out the Witcher, occasionally even sentences bordering on poetic.

He has lived a long life, Jaskier knows this, and when he finds things that are a constant throughout the years, it tends to make him a touch wistful and nostalgic.

What could be more constant than the moon?

Roach makes herself comfortable, getting down onto her knees, seeming to glare at him when the saddle restricts her from laying as she wants.

“Sorry.” Jaskier whispers to her. “I’ll buy you a whole bucket of apples.”

He thinks she snorts, her tail swishing, then turns her head to face away.

A nudge at his side brings Jaskier’s attention down to E, who then indicates to the other children.

All blink wide eyes up at him, not the slightest bit sleepy.

He snorts. “Good evening. I thought you’d all pass out as soon as you got comfortable. It must be hours after your bedtimes.”

None of them offer any words back, but a small hand, belonging to the youngest boy, he thinks, curls tighter into his shirt.

“Okay, okay, how about a lullaby?”

Jaskier doesn’t exactly get a yes, but he doesn’t receive a no, either, so he settles back, runs his hands over exposed arms and heads and feet to help keep them all warm, and recounts the oldest lullaby he knows, aiming for the softest voice he can manage when he can’t hear his own voice. It would not do to draw unwanted interest just by trying to get them to sleep.

The song was something his Grandmother used to sing to him, those evenings when she was staying over at their house and indulgently allowed Jaskier to drag her to his bedchamber so he could tell her a story. Apparently, it was passed down from her mother, who got it from her mother, and so on back through the generations.

“It’s something that connects our family together.” She had whispered to him, her voice frail with age and eyes warm. “Something more meaningful than blood. We can feel the emotions of our ancestors, and we speak the very same words, and one day your children and your children’s children will share it with their little ones too. It predates us, and it outlives us, as all good things should.”

His Mother never sang it to him.

Later, he realised why.

“Bastard child.” His Father had muttered all Jaskier’s life, and when he was old enough, he realised that stretched further than just a simple harsh insult.

He had emptied his Mother’s womb, he found out, when his Father was drunk and yet another argument went further than it should, and she had never been able to conceive again.

The stubborn git never figured that may have been something to do with his own lack of seed.

The song itself is actually pretty sad, a declaration of a love by a woman who realises her infant daughter will not last the morning, weeping as she sings her little one to sleep for a final time. Grandmother didn’t know if it was based on a family experience or if it was simply just a sad tale, but every time she sang it, she reminded Jaskier of the message behind the words.

“Remember to love, Julian,” She would say, hushed, as if sharing forbidden knowledge, “To hold those you care about and appreciate them for who they are, for one day they may be gone and you can never tell them you can love them again.”

Once, when he was drunk and lonely and he and Geralt had parted ways as they naturally do from time to time, Jaskier tried to write the tune down in his songbook, lute in hand. The page, damp from dripping tears and spilt warm ale, had ended up a blurred and sorry mess of sloppy pencil marks and correction after correction after correction as he tried to do the song justice.

Maybe it was the fact that he was drunk, but that night, despite all his years composing, and knowing damn well how to write out a melody for a song, he simply had not been able to hack it. Nothing felt right, the notes failing to meet the quality the lullaby deserved, as if he was picking out scratchy clothes at the market to dress a queen.

Perhaps there are some songs which are simply too sacred to be bastardised on paper.

He had been nine when his Grandmother passed away, on a sweet, early spring morning, just as the blossom was starting to bloom and the leaves kiss the branches of the hibernating trees.

A decade a widow, it fell upon his parents to arrange her funeral and burial.

Jaskier thought the end of the garden would have been perfect, surrounded by the flowers and the bees, just above the pond she used to sit and draw with shaky fingers and clouding vision. Sometimes, when the weather permitted, she would draw the same picture over and over again, and by the afternoon would sit surrounded by as many as fifteen different versions, each with slightly different details, shading, proportions and highlights.

“An attempt at art is never an attempt wasted.” She had smiled at him.

His Father dumped her in the local cemetery, a boulder found in the woods thudded down on top of her as if to make sure she stayed with the worms. His Mother, never the woman to go against her husband’s wishes (and looking back, Jaskier has an idea where that spawned from), went along with it, scolding him when he protested.

As he grew, Jaskier tried several times to move the boulder so he could plant flowers for his Grandmother. He ended up locked in his room when he successfully managed to shove it halfway off with the help of a borrowed plough horse from the farm, and his Father decided to ‘compromise’ with his distaste by having someone carve her name into the stone, rather than actually listen.

“ _Don’t_ tell me I never listen.” His Father had growled. “Look at what I’ve paid for, just for you.”

The day he left home, or rather night, because he had to climb out his window once everyone was asleep, Jaskier spread a whole bouquet on her stone, daffodils and primroses and bluebells and dandelions, and sung to her the lullaby in promise that he would one day return and build her a proper tomb by the pond, just as she would have wished.

Quietly, the song comes to an end, and without thinking Jaskier loops back to the beginning again, then again, then again, until his voice is rough and his mouth dry. 

The children, even E, have gradually become a collective deadweight, slumping with sleep and breathing deeply. One of the girls keeps twitching, and absently Jaskier settles her, his fingers dancing over her head as if strumming, focused on the forest, the night, and watching for the gleam of deadly eyes. More than once he checks he still has his stick.

****

*****

As time goes on, Jaskier can feel the need to drift into slumber tug at his eyelids, aided somewhat by the silence in his ears. His head bobs on his neck as he catches himself, snapping up harshly every time he catches the hint of dreams nudging at his mind, urging his lips to continue with his unheard performance.

Around him, the night passes, long and slow and dull, the only company the muted words of his family lullaby and the memories of his Grandmother. The moon drags itself across the sky, and when the lullaby becomes too much, Jaskier waxes lyrics about that instead, describing the shape, the colour, the accompaniment of stars as they trail like hunting dogs behind their leader.

When the faintest blush of pink starts rising on the horizon, bringing with it the promise of Geralt and warmth, Jaskier feels his body slump a little less rigidly against the tree, a weak breath breaking through his tunes with the knowledge he saw them through the dark. 

As the sunlight grows, trickling between the trees like a clear, fresh stream, Jaskier realises the stick he had picked up was actually half rotten, disintegrating further from the handling.

Oh. 

That could have been bad.

Roach is the first to wake, but her whinnying swiftly startles everyone else, making E sit bolt upright while the girls jump out their skin, reaching for each other. The youngest boy, eyes big, instantly starts to cry, clambering up Jaskier in a demand for a cuddle as his bottom lip trembles.

“Thanks, Roach.” Jaskier croaks, and he is pretty sure the horse sends him a _that’s what you get._

Pulling away from their huddle, E stretches, his face splitting with a yawn, and meanders to the middle of their small and overgrown clearing to warm himself in the sun.

Their clearing, now Jaskier looks at it in the daylight, really isn’t much of one. Even Geralt would avoid it if they were camping, too small for their things, a fire, their bedrolls, and Roach. What is more probable is that this is simply a shaded area from the bigger tree they were leant against, the tangles of thorns, heavily green bushes, and weeds unable grow here or risk never seeing the sunlight.

How Roach managed to get find it is anyone’s guess. Jaskier certainly can’t see any path she would have followed.

Setting the boy aside, he reclaims his doublet, covering his arms now chilled to the bone. The dagger wound, stiff and sore and really needing to be seen to soon, sends a shooting flare across his back, just to give him a nice, welcoming start to the day.

As he claws his way up to his feet, legs locked from a night fixed into one position, a small hand tugs at his trousers.

“Hm?”

The youngest boy, over his tears but still snotty, says something, his lips a jumbled mess of toddler words.

Squinting, because for some reason his brain keeps thinks doing something with his eyes will fix the problem with his ears, he rasps, “What was that?”

Dancing on his feet and fisting his hands in the start of a tantrum, the boy repeats himself, not even fully looking at Jaskier anymore.

A tap on his elbow brings his attention to E, who then reaches out a hand for the boy and drags him into the bushes, ducking them under the thorns. Concerned, Jaskier follows them, bouncing up on his toes to peer over the top of the foliage.

He abruptly spins on his heel when he finds E aiming the kid at a nearby tree.

Ah, right, carry on men.

That just leaves him and the girls, who stare silently up at him, one frowning as if he isn’t supposed to be there and the other gnawing at her lip, a habit she often does, going by the light scars already decorating her skin.

Gulping to try and bring a bit of moisture to his throat, Jaskier offers, “If you two need to find a bush, you can. Just don’t go far and come right back.”

They glance at each other, muttering lowly to themselves, then march away from him, hitching up their clothes.

His palms find his face. “I’m not qualified for this.”

Roach appears to agree, getting to her feet so she can stomp angrily at him, tossing her mane and flaring her nostrils. He waves her off, making sure to keep fingers well out teeth range.

“Yeah, yeah, I’ve already promised you apples. Why don’t-” With a soft _oof_ , Jaskier staggers at the sudden impact into his side, E insistently tugging at his shirt. The youngest boy toddles after him on unstable legs. “What? What is it?”

Pointing off into the trees, E indicates to his ears, and Jaskier feels his already parched mouth turn to dry sand.

“You hear something?”

A nod.

Squatting, Jaskier asks, tipping his voice to a whisper, “What can you hear?”

His hands cupped around his mouth, E mimics calling out, and with a frown, Jaskier tilts his head to the side, watching the formation of E’s mouth intently.

“They’re…Yelling my name?”

Beside them, Roach flings her head and neighs, trotting back and forth where she is tethered, ears perked.

Watching her, and the direction she is looking, Jaskier stands and follows her gaze, finding nothing but greenery and twigs. Sore throat be damned, he hesitantly calls out, “Geralt?”

For a second nothing happens, a long moment where Jaskier can’t decide whether to panic or hold his nerve just in case. Then, as if a spellbinding tale which holds an entire tavern captive, the bushes and undergrowth begin to shake, parting and snapping as something large pushes towards them.

Almost instantly the two sisters are back and clinging to him, almost dragging him down from how much they pull. The youngest boy joins them, making grabby hands to be picked up and babbling, copying the girls in their panic.

Slowly, Jaskier drags his gaze back to Roach, who is more frustrated with being tethered than anything else, and then to E, who wears a look of someone trying to hear something faint in the distance, his face angled and eyes hazy with concentration.

Three scared children versus one cross mare and calm near-teenager.

Melitele’s tits, if he gets this wrong…

“Geralt? Is that you?”

E steps forward, hope starting to flicker across his face as he yells out a, “Mum?”

The youngest boy is getting fed up with being ignored, clutching at his trousers and shaking them with as much violence as he can muster. As his hands, in their insistence, get dangerously close to hitting an area which would be infinitely more painful if mishandled, Jaskier tuts and bends to pick him up.

His timing is perfect in the fact that he near screams when, at the very same moment, something tall and black staggers through the bushes into the clearing.

“Holy _shit_ , Geralt!” Jaskier yelps, darting several paces back and squeezing the boy in his arms. His heart hammers. “You can’t just _appear_ like that!”

Geralt stands, panting, brows furrowed and body tense, his leathers marred with several kinds of dirt that will take a good cleaning session to remove. Blood, dried brown and starting to flake, is sprayed across his face, but a quick glance up and down reveals it is probably someone else’s. Against his back, his sword looks equally as grubby, and as Jaskier calms he notices another familiar shape slung across Geralt’s shoulder.

“Is that my _lute?”_

Jaw tight, Geralt fixes him with a glare, probably humming grumpily at his lack of priorities. Going by the dark circles beneath his eyes, there is little difference in how much sleep they have had between them.

With a methodical stiffness, Geralt takes them in one by one, as if he is doing a mental headcount to check Jaskier still has as many children as he started with, which is _insulting_. Then the Witcher barks over his shoulder, and the brush wobbles again as a cluster of people come stumbling in their direction.

The reaction from the kids is instant.

E goes shooting off like a hound released, racing towards the outstretched hands of a battered and bruised woman, while the girls abandon his legs in favour of the open arms of an elderly man, a cut on his head and one eye blackened shut.

Wiggling in his arms, the youngest boy clocks onto a twenty-something-year-old girl with black hair and immediately decides that, actually, he _doesn’t_ want to be picked up right now, and would very much like to be put down, please.

He conveys this by hitting Jaskier in the face.

Rolling his eyes, which earns a chuckle from the young mother, he sets the boy on his feet and he goes tripping off towards her.

When Jaskier turns his attention back to Geralt, he has moved towards his horse, frowning at the saddle and the reigns as he carefully runs a hand down Roach’s neck, murmuring at her. Roach, the absolute traitor, plays the part of wounded party perfectly, hanging her head low and giving what must be the horse equivalent of puppy-dog-eyes.

“See if you get your apples.” Jaskier snips.

Going by the face Geralt pulls, he growls at him, striding up to Jaskier as if he had just said black leather is out of fashion.

“You were supposed-” Is all Jaskier can make out before the rest becomes an incoherent mess of red words, Geralt waving an arm off in a purposeful direction somewhere west.

For once, Jaskier is pretty pleased he is missing out on what Geralt is saying, considering it is probably rude and presumptuous. He waits, arms crossed, subtly trying to take in the state of his lute. His fingers itch to hold it, to check for blemishes and dents, but trying to snatch it away would only make Geralt angrier, which in turn would make him rave for longer.

Jaskier figured that out while still under his Father’s roof.

The rant lasts a while, during which the children and Roach both seem to get some kind of mention, and by the end Geralt is breathing hard, seething. Jaskier has been on the end of a few _miscommunications_ with the Witcher before, but this might be the first time he has ever been outrightly shouted at for something.

Slowly, Jaskier forces his mouth into an unamused smile.

Maybe Geralt is more exhausted than he realises, or maybe he is just more willing to put up with Jaskier’s shit after so long travelling together, because he completely fails to duck when Jaskier promptly whacks him on the side of the head.

“For someone who’s meant to be observant as fuck, you can be pretty thick at times.” Hands on his hips, Jaskier fixes the blinking Geralt with a look so fierce anyone in their right mind would shrink from it. “Did you _try_ to listen to what I was saying you in town, even just a little?”

Scowling, Geralt opens his mouth to grouse something snide and rumbling, but with an eyeroll that honestly hurts, Jaskier beats him to it, waving frantically at his ears.

“I can’t hear, you ass! I had my ears blown out! I’ve had nothing but ringing and _blessed silence_ since I woke up on the tavern floor!”

Wheels start turning behind Geralt’s eyes, but not fast enough for the night Jaskier just had to endure.

“I tried to tell you, but what did you do? You dumped me on a horse with an armful of kids then sent me off into the woods! I don’t know what you wanted me to do, I _can’t hear!”_ Clucking his tongue, he adds, stroppy, “You’re not exactly easy to follow, Geralt, my lip reading can only go so far.”

The Witcher, at least, has the curtesy to look a little abashed, and carefully he reaches up to cup Jaskier’s chin, tilting his head so he can inspect his ears. A gloved finger glides over the trail of blood Jaskier had honestly forgotten was there.

Humming, going by the vibrations tickling against his skin, Geralt releases him, and asks, with a wider and more exaggerated mouth than he has ever used before, “You still can’t hear anything?”

Clicking his fingers to demonstrate, Jaskier shakes his head and shrugs.

Making what must be a ‘tch’ noise between his teeth, Geralt sighs and steps away, glancing over in the direction of the reunited families. Jaskier follows his gaze, smiling when E, in the process of getting peppered with kisses from his mother, waves at him.

He startles when something gets shoved into his hands.

It is his lute, her condition practically pristine save for a few leaves caught in her strings and a twig he can see has fallen inside. It slides about as he angles it in the light, scanning for cracks in the intricately carved wood.

Whatever gets said about the elves, they make damn good lutes.

He cradles her to his chest, and Geralt nods his head, suddenly finding the dirt incredibly interesting. 

It is as close to an apology as Jaskier will get, and perhaps it is the exhaustion talking, but he is ready to accept it and move on.

The gesture is soured somewhat when the lute knocks his bad shoulder as he secures it over his back, making him flinch and groan.

Frowning again, Geralt gets him to turn around, and prods at the injury.

“Tell me, will I ever play again?”

He gets a light swat to the back of the head for that, but it is barely a flick of a thing, and when Jaskier spins back around Geralt has an eyebrow raised, the faintest hint of a smirk tugging at his mouth. Then he returns his full attention back to Roach.

“So, now what?”

“We go get our things from the inn.” Securing his sword to Roach’s saddle, Geralt untethers her, keeping his face visible to Jaskier so he can follow the conversation. “Then find you a healer, or a mage.”

Clutching at his heart, Jaskier sighs dramatically. “Oh, _sweet_ Geralt of Rivia, you do care for your humble travel compan-”

A stick gets thrown at his face.

Three days later…

“Yennefer, you _bitch!_ You said it wouldn’t hurt!”

“Woops.”

“Don’t _woops_ me!”

**Author's Note:**

> Me, just over seven thousand words in: Wait, his name is Geralt, right?
> 
> [Tumblr](https://ancientstone.tumblr.com/)


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